Media Galleries : Advanced Development

The ACCA program was initiated in April 2007 to capitalize on the investment in composite materials made by government and industry over the last three decades through the Composites Affordability Initiative. Greater use of the fiber- and resin-based composite materials, which are both strong and light weight, is seen as the way to significantly reduce development time and costs for new aircraft.

Origins of the SR 71 date back to the late 1950s when legendary Lockheed designer and Skunk Works founder Clarence L. "Kelly" Johnson proposed a high speed, high altitude alternative to supplement the Lockheed-built U-2 subsonic reconnaissance plane that would soon become vulnerable to Soviet missiles. As a result, the Blackbird family was initiated with the A 12, which first flew in April 1962. The single-seat A-12s were the smallest of the Blackbird series. Designed for reconnaissance missions, the A-12 spawned a two-place, armed version designated YF-12A, which was proposed as an interceptor. Although never adopted for this role, the YF-12s made important contributions as research aircraft, serving for more than a decade with NASA. It was the first aircraft capable of sustaining speeds above Mach 3.

The official beginning of the ATF program usually traces to 1981 when USAF Aeronautical Systems Division, or ASD, released a request for information for concepts for an advanced tactical fighter. The term advanced tactical fighter and its abbreviation, ATF, however, appeared in a general operational requirements document issued to contractors by the Advanced Planning Branch of ASD almost ten years earlier in 1972.